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| Title | Magia Naturalis |
| Author | Della Porta, Giambattista |
| Asset Number | 00581 |
| Publisher | Andrea Wecheli |
| ISBN | |
| Published Date | 1591 |
| Edition | 1 |
| Printing | 1 |
| Description | Vellum hardcover. Top of spine missing. Boards and binding tight.
Magia Naturalis (in English, Natural Magic) is a work of popular science by Giambattista della Porta first published in Naples in 1558. Its popularity ensured it was republished in five Latin editions within ten years, with translations into Italian (1560), French, (1565) Dutch (1566) and English (1658) printed.
Natural Magic was revised and considerably expanded throughout the author's lifetime; its twenty books (Naples 1589) include observations upon geology, optics, medicines, poisons, cooking, metallurgy, magnetism, cosmetics, perfumes, gunpowder, and invisible writing.
Natural Magic is an example of pre-Baconian science. Its sources include the ancient learning of Pliny the Elder and Theophrastus as well as numerous scientific observations made by Della Porta.
He was interested in optics and was a contemporary of Galileo in the development of the principles behind the telescope. In Book XVII of Natural Magic, Giambattista is the first to add a concave lens to the already invented 'camera obscura'. He experimented with both convex and concave lenses in order to clarify the image of the lens and to provide a mathematical explanation for their refractive properties. Giambattista was actually theorized to have priority in the invention of the telescope, but he reveals his secondary position to Galileo in an unpublished treatise that fails to discuss anything other than his contemporary's work. |
| Category | General Science |
| Epoch | Pre 1840 |
| Date Acquired | 10/11/2022 |
| Condition | (3) Good |
